BCC was profitable within about a month of conception and has been since then.
AR will, knock on wood, probably hit cash-flow positive in May (about six months after launch) and pay back development costs in a month or two after that. I was originally targeting 12 months for surpassing BCC & consulting but, knock on wood, I have since learned something about my market which may make that pessimistic.
My apologies, I think that phrasing was difficult to parse: the 12 month estimate was excessively pessimistic (i.e. it probably won't take that long, because the market is better than I expected it to be).
I had been basing my projections off of running a medium-volume low-touch business with average yearly account values in the $500 range. It turns out there is an addressable market for which average yearly account values are in the five figure range. More detail on that in a blog post Friday-ish.
Would love to hear more about your experience in this industry and where you think you fit with the bigger players out there (televox, smilereminder etc.)
The short version is that, if everything goes according to plan, they are Big Consultingware Project Management and I am Basecamp. (Or, to put it another way, I'm not competing with them, I'm competing with non-consumption of services.)
AR will, knock on wood, probably hit cash-flow positive in May (about six months after launch) and pay back development costs in a month or two after that. I was originally targeting 12 months for surpassing BCC & consulting but, knock on wood, I have since learned something about my market which may make that pessimistic.